Outposts

WadeKwon.com has reached the 5-year mark. What a sad occasion.

This personal site, which sprang fully formed from my cranium on March 23, 2006, has devolved from a daily repository of my stories to a much neglected storage bin of tweets.

Thousands of tweets.

The necessity of limited time has forced this cutback. Fortunately, other stories have emerged in some old and some new haunts.

Websites

• The mothership, Wade on Birmingham, continues to showcase my daily haiku, as well as a smattering of city- and state-related posts. It, too, recently marked 5 years on the Internet. This year, so far, has been dominated by reality TV coverage, as often happens.

• Media of Birmingham has also suffered in the great work shift. Still worthy stories to be told there, but my hope remains that the new board I left behind me will populate it with content beyond housekeeping posts.

• My consulting company, Birmingham Blogging Academy, has seen a resurgence in timely essays on communication, leadership, cooperation, community, social media and more. My newsletter readers receive a bonus each week, because I’ve been working hard to provide special news and information just for them.

• My audaciously big site, Magic City Post, continues to deliver positive news about my hometown, while expanding to include other writers and bloggers. It has been a wonderful use of both honed skills and new storytelling techniques in one site, which launched in October. Please take a look.

• Coming soon: the dynamic and useful Alabama Social Media Association official site. I helped start this nonprofit group which launched this month. Yes, it will have a blog. Yes, I will write for it, along with others. Yes, it will be mostly about social media. And yes, you will want to read it.

Social media

• Twitter is where it’s happening for me. You don’t even have to be signed up to read it. It’s where you talk to me directly in real time. It’s where I share my links to everything happening in Birmingham, in current events, in communication, in business and more.

In short, it’s where I have the most online conversations. It’s where I can be the most helpful to you and to others.

My Facebook profile echoes my tweets. My LinkedIn profile echoes only the business-related tweets. Google Buzz is … well, not high on my list (I don’t even know how to link you to it, or if I can).

My Twitter channel is also where I share my guest posts. That right: I even blog on many other sites beyond this expanding stable.

With more than 22,000 tweets and 3,000 followers, it’s my go-to place for keeping up with my friends, my associates and the wide, wide world. Check in on @WadeOnTweets to see why I’m so engaged in it.

At large

As a consultant, a trainer and a speaker, I go out of my way to meet clients and prospective clients around the country. So I give talks and training sessions while also making time for a lot of coffee meetings. And I don’t even like coffee.

But I do like asking questions. Many questions. And listening. And taking notes. It’s how I learn best.

Those don’t often show up in my tweets. But they happen every week, sometimes every day.

That’s how my business runs. Communication offline, as well as online.

And so, while this personal site sees a few rare originals from me — despite the 50 story ideas in my head — my outposts do exist and do thrive elsewhere.

All I ask is that you come meet me there.

Otherwise, see you in 5 years.

Photo: Chuck Coker (CC)